US v. Army SPC

Sep 25, 2013

OUTCOME: FULL ACQUITTAL

September 2013 Schofield Barracks, HI. Army E4 facing charges of sexual assault, forcible sodomy, and simple assault. The military TDS lawyers, he had two, both women, recommended he take the governmen ... t's plea deal. The accused hired Mr. Tipon to fight for his rights. During the course of the trial, the government of the United States refused to take reasonable efforts to subpoena exculpatory Facebook messages. Just the same efforts they would have used to get the Facebook messages if they would have helped the government case. The accused and the alleged victim had dated for a year and had an ongoing sexual relationship. When the accused refused to "take the relationship to the next level" the alleged victim fabricated allegations of rape. Not the first time they had sex or the last time they had sex, but one of the dozens of times in the middle of their relationship where they had sex. The accused wanted to break up with the alleged victim and start seeing other people. After their relationship ended, the alleged victim sent several Facebook messages to the accused begging him to have sex with her "one last time." The accused rebuffed her requests. And Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned. She then made an allegation of rape. She claimed that the accused's alcohol use caused her to freeze up one time during sex and that she really didn't want to have sex, but because she froze up it was rape. Despite the fact that the government had all of those facts and even knew what the Facebook messages sent, they went forward with prosecuting the accused. In fact, the government put 3 prosecutors on the case one of whom was a Special Victim's Prosecutor and a "highly qualified expert" to bolster the prosecution team. The government hired a clinical psychologist who was a tenured professor at Cal. State Fullerton to testify at trial. The TDS lawyers were unprepared to challenge this "expert" at trial. Mr. Tipon had to get the defense's own psychologist to assist the defense. The accused was brought to CID to be interrogated. He sat in the interrogation room for 7 hours. For 6 1/2 hours, he denied raping the alleged victim. But the CID agents would not relent until they got a "confession." The CID agent testified in court that the accused confessed to raping the alleged victim, which was misleading to the jury. Mr. Tipon, at trial, played over 2 hours of the video taped interview for the jury against the advice of the military lawyers, against the request of the prosecutors and even though the military judge encouraged Mr. Tipon not to play the video "because the jury can watch it for themselves if they really want to." The tape showed how the accused was manipulated and kept in the interrogation room being told he was a liar and that his story didn't make sense and how the alleged victim's story did over and over. At trial Through the crucible of cross examination, the alleged victim's true motives and lies were exposed. The government's clinical psychologist folded under cross examination and finally confessed that she did not use "common sense" to figure out whether the alleged victim's story was true. At the end of the trial, the jury acquitted Mr. Tipon's client of all the charges and specifications. The accused was allowed to PCS and is now back in his job as a soldier in the US Army.